10.31.2004

William Gibson on on the Osama Bin Laden tape

William Gibson has a couple posts on the OBL tape. One where he theorizes on the meaning of it all, and one where he rethinks his conclusions.

Personally, it seems to me that the tape was an effort to reach out and clarify the madness. I almost said "stop the madness" but I'm not so sure of that. But I got the impression that even Bin Laden is worried about the way things are headed. Not afraid that his plans are going to be stopped, but afraid that there is simply too much chaos following US actions abroad and this tape was a message to reach out and say hey, just so you know, this is why things are the way they are and you're making it so much worse every day that even I'm shocked.